Highgrove Gardens

Did you know that Prince Charles is a devoted and spectacularly gifted gardener and designer?

After an evening of ice skating last weekend, we came home and collapsed on to the couch to discover a PBS show on his gardens. He has an entire garden room called The Stumpery {first photo} - that features old branches, moss and ferns that grow among the rotting wood and around a small temple. HRH was also a huge proponent of organic gardening - decades before it was a thing. Enough of my yammering - take a look at these photos. {Here is a link to the show we watched, too.}

Source: thespec.com via Tracey on Pinterest

Source: portersgarden.hampshire.org.uk via Tracey on Pinterest

Source: highgrovegardens.com via Tracey on Pinterest

Ruth Stout Was A Bad Ass (And You Can Be One Too!)

I took Ruth Stout's No-Work Garden Book out of the library last month (and then again, this month, renewing it as often as is allowed) and it has me ready to get back out to our vegetable garden. Including a future asparagus bed and possibly, just maybe, revisiting a strawberry patch. Without the elaborate trench digging for the asparagus or the hair-pulling frustration of strawberry patch weeding.

Ruth Stout gardened well into her 80s and was one of the first gardeners to write about organic alternatives. Her no-work method basically involves six to eight inches of mulch - straw, hay, shredded leaves, kitchen scrap, pine needles. The thick mulch cuts back on weeding and watering. That just leaves mulching, planting and growing. The latter two being every gardener's favorite things ever! Whenever she saw a weed, she tossed more mulch on top of it instead of removing the interloper. Hah!

One of my favorite quotes of Ruth's - after writing on old gardening methods: "I think I'll go lie down now. I'm exhausted just from writing about all the unnecessary work that some people do."

These recently discovered videos are astoungdingly wonderful. I love Ruth's no-nonsense New Englander attitude and now hear her voice as I read her book. She was a rabble-rouser from her youth and used to garden on her Connecticut plot buck-naked!

Spring Dreaming :: CSAs

Two of my mama friends are also organic farmers and run CSA's (community supported agriculture). Steph owns New Branch Farm and is offering unique options for those interested in a CSA this year. From her website:

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One of the distinctions of our CSA is the season. We are offering both:

• a spring share (12 weeks) and
• an autumn share (9 weeks).

In each season, you also have choice of the "Traditional Share" or the "Salad Share".

Traditional Share: A variety of seasonal, certified organic vegetables and herbs: we strive to provide 6-10 items weekly in quantities ample for 2 people. Our goal is to provide a diversity of vegetables. For example, our popular greens mix, arugula, and lettuces mixed with traditional favorites like potatoes, garlic, and tomatoes as well as more specialty items like haricot vert beans. In the spring, an assortment of potted plants for home growing are also offered.

Salad Share: If you're a salad lover, this share is sure to excite. Inspired by our mixed greens and arugula - City Market customer favorites. The weekly bag includes over a pound of various lettuces and greens (items will vary weekly but will be some combination of lettuce, mixed greens, and arugula). In addition, items to provide your salad with color, crunch, or garnish will be included (will vary weekly but possibilities include radishes, salad turnips, fresh herbs, garlic, etc).

Both shares also include a farm note and recipes.

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I just joined Trish's CSA yesterday - my first CSA ever. Innisfree is literally down the road from us and we are splitting a share with another family (Thanks, Christine!). We are also doing an egg share.

Although I'll be doing my own gardening in Sugar Hollow, I'm still not sure how productive I will be this season and a CSA will get me to try vegetables that I normally overlook in the store (like cabbage and parsnips). If my garden is productive, friends and I have been talking about teaching each other different ways of preserving our harvests.

Spring, you can't arrive soon enough!

A Marriage in the (Ignored) Garden

Love means having a husband who doesn't give you a hard time for biting off more than you can chew. Garden-wise. Instead, he quietly helps you reclaim what has become overrun and completely unruly. He spends part of his weekend battling the wicked thistles - because a few months ago, you came inside - weepy. Croaking that it looked as if whoever used to tend our gardens seemed to have either died or up and left. He tells you that the aforementioned gardener was actually very busy doing something else. Bringing another life into this world and nurturing her in the best way possible. And, I melt.

So we worked together this past weekend. Battling the brush and the thorns. Bringing hope for the following spring planting season.

I also called on the experience of fellow gardeners in the Piedmont Virginia Garden Swap for their thoughts on reclaiming an ignored (but much beloved!) garden. Many recommended sheet mulching with newspaper and cardboard (we are trying that - with cardboard only - as we are growing food in these beds and are wary of the chemicals in newspaper). April's comment to me - about wearing my ignored garden as a badge of (mama) honor - made me puff my chest out and smile. Thanks, girl.

Over dinner last night, friends of ours (Reed and Christine of the Blue Ridge Permaculture Network) mentioned an organic farming friend who uses plastic mulch and plants in plastic mulch. We have a supply of black plastic that we'll be trying for the fall and winter - to smother what weeds we can and start anew in 2009. But planting in plastic? Must investigate further. This ATTRA article is interesting.

I can't wait to get back to growing our own food. With the lean times and the world being topsy-turvy lately - it will become more and more important to tend to our own plots and harvests. Our century's version of a Victory Garden.

Fall Garden Chores: Steph of New Branch Farm

I asked several of my gardening friends to tell me about their favorite fall garden tasks.

Stephanie owns and operates New Branch Farm - an organic farm just outside of Charlottesville. She is also a new mom to Ryan. How she does both befuddles me. Make sure to visit Steph at the C'ville City Market on Saturday mornings. She will be selling arugula, basil, eggplant, green beans, greens mixes, garlic, lettuce mixes, radishes, tomatoes and tomatillos.

From Steph:

My favorite fall activity is planting garlic. It's a welcome break from all the fall field "clean-up" - tilling in earlier plantings, bringing in tomato stakes and row covers for winter storage, etc. You can plant garlic late in the fall so it usually one of the last outdoor farm activities I do (I usually plant between late October to mid November).

Good catalog resources for garlic are Johnny's Selected Seeds and Southern Exposure Seed Exchange.

In Which I Daydream About Worm Poo

Is it super-strange that I dreamily think about this suped-up worm compost palace-slash-factory for my birthday wish list? Note the spout at the bottom. That is a pipeline to compost tea, my friends.

The value of worm castings has hit the front of my brain - since I started feeding my houseplants with TerraCycle liquified worm poop. More gold than gross, my plants are totally the better for it. It also seems that the worm casting products go unnoticed by the three snouts of our hound-y, scent-driven doggies. Chalk another one up for this form of organic fertilizer.

More soon on vermiculture and the worm compost quest. A terrific winter gardening project.

Garden Questions Answered :: Feed Your Plants

Hello there,

I am from Richmond and I came across your blog. I am allergic to chemical fertilizers. I was wondering if you know of any great organic fertilizers. Thank you so much!

J. C.
Richmond, Virginia

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Hi J. C.,

Absolutely!

1. Merrill's Compost Tea (my new favorite - made from poultry manure)
2. Plant-tone
3. Neptune's Harvest Organic Fertilizer (made with fish, sea weed and/or sea kelp)

But I should warn you, if you have cats or dogs - #s 2 and 3 can make them go beserk-er and rifle through the soil and uproot your plants. The smell of dead stuff (Plant-tone contains things like crab meat and, um, dried blood) causes our little woofers to dig and dig and dig until they have found the source of the smell. I learned that the hard way.

I just finished reading Helen Nearing's Loving and Leaving the Good Life, after totally loving the book she co-authored with her husband about homesteading, The Good Life. Helen and Scott Nearing's amazing Maine gardens were fed heavily with sea weed. Neptune's Harvest has it right.

You can order the compost tea directly from Merrill's. You just throw the tea bag into a gallon of water, let it steep for about 10 minutes and then feed your plants! They will gulp it down happily.

Very best . . . Tracey

Halt! Put Down That Spray, Plant A Marigold

Marigolds standing sentry for my green bean plants in a raised bed.

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There are certain plants that actually attract beneficial (or predatory) insects. Insects that'll eat and banish the bad buggers. This glorious food chain can be harnessed on a small scale in your own garden (container or veggie). Here's the low-down.

I'm keeping this experiment small, as it usually takes me a while to wrap my head around the more scientific-end of gardening. I am testing out three 'host plants' - marigolds, cosmos and zinnias - in my vegetable beds.

Who The Hosts Attract

Cosmos (usually the white ones) - hoverfly, parasitic wasp, lacewing

Marigolds - ladybug, hoverfly, parasitic wasp

Zinnias - hoverfly, parasitic wasp

Who The Predators Hunt

Ladybug - aphids, aphids, aphids!

Lacewing - aphids, spider mites, thrips, whiteflies, eggs of leafhoppers, moths, leafminers, smaller caterpillars, beetle larvae, long-tailed mealy bug

Hoverfly - aphids, mealy bugs, leafhoppers, thrips and scale larvae

Parasitic wasp - caterpillars and caterpillar eggs

You can usually snag a four pack of these annuals for around $1.25. While stinky, scary pesticides cost a pretty penny. So . . . not too shabby.

Let the battles begin.

DIY - Building a Raised Bed

My introduction to our land was almost comical. Not truly knowing its history, I set out during my first spring in Sugar Hollow with great hopes. I arose with the sun - with a naive plan to create my little bit of heaven. All 5' 1" one of me.

I stretched in the sunlight, took in a deep breath of mountain air, put my shovel over my shoulder and headed out back with a spring in my step. I readied myself and went to dig my first patch of land. Then, in an almost Wile E. Coyote-moment, the shovel hit the compacted clay - making my arms, and then whole body, vibrate with the impact.

Disappointed and immediately overwhelmed, I went back to the drawing board. Clay compacted by cattle for decades was not going to be moved by the likes of me. Then, an idea - The Raised Bed.

Lumber. We are trying to do things as organically as possible. When we built these beds a few years back, we used borate-treated pine. Be forewarned, it is expensive and heavy. You could also use composite decking material. Some people just use downed trees. Or, if you do the lasagna bed method, you don't even need lumber.

From the Ground Up. We put chicken wire as the base layer (to foil little diggers and voles). Then, I would recommend you lay cardboard down. It will suppress weeds (but does eventually break down). Follow that with a mixture of compost, shredded leaves, grass clippings, coco-peat (a.k.a. coir) - to create your soil. If you have access to nice topsoil, that'll certainly do, as well. Then, top it off with a generous helping of mulch. Make sure to replenish the soil with either compost throughout the season or cover crops.

Pathways. This turned out to be one of the more time-consuming aspects of our raised bed area. First year - we went with grass pathways that were tricky to keep up with . . . and I mean tricky in that we'd-rather-sit-on-the-deck-and-drink-a-beer-vs.-mow-the-pathways-kinda way. The second year - I tried landscape fabric. Um. Landscape fabric is a ruse. A scam. Useless. It was complete mayhem out there last summer. This year, I'm thinking that I have it in the bag (as I thought I did last year. A-hem.). I put layers of cardboard down and covered it with a thick layer of straw. Fingers crossed.

Fencing. I have found that there are certain crops our local deer enjoy more than others (i.e. tomatoes). So, to help safeguard those plants, Corey attached posts to one of our larger raised beds. Then, depending on my energy level, I either staple deer fencing to the posts - or just wrap fishing line around the posts at several levels (the deer walk into the 'invisible' line as they go for a nibble and get spooked).

The Goods. I have had great luck growing tomatoes, greens (kale, swiss chard), lettuce, spinach, radishes, peas, beans, zucchini, herbs, annuals and potatoes in these raised beds. I am testing out rhubarb, onions and asparagus this year. Corn and pumpkins will go in the ground - in a small plot next to the beds.

Cover Crops: The Hub-Bub

I don't know about you, but the vagueness of the term cover crop just confused me more than absolutely necessary. As did green manure. But I don't see things changing on the re-definition or re-naming front.

What I do know is that these plantings are valuable to the soil on so many different levels. So, we'll just need to work with what we have.

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For the most accurate and accessible definitions, I turned to the experts. In this case, Johnny's Selected Seeds.

A cover crop is a "crop grown to cover the soil and prevent erosion."

A green manure "replenishes organic matter. Nutrients are released in the topsoil as the green manure decomposes."

A smother crop "is used in new ground or in weed-infested soil to out compete the weeds."

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For heavy, poorly-drained soil - try soybeans, sunflowers or white clover.

For compacted soil - try buckwheat, clovers, alfalfa or any clover.

Weedy areas can be conquered with red clover, soybeans, sunflowers, buckwheat or hairy vetch.

If your soil lacks nitrogen - try legumes, chickling vetch, winter rye, hairy vetch.

Oats are a general great green manure.

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Cover crops by season (when to sow . . . ):

• Spring - oats, spring wheat, chickling vetch, red clover, sweet clover, ryegrass
• Spring/Summer - hairy vetch, red clover, sweet clover, summer alfalfa, buckwheat, soybeans, sunflowers
• Late summer - crimson clover, purple tansy, ryegrass
• Fall - red clover, ryegrass, winter rye

I am testing out two crops this year - buckwheat and red clover . . . and am starting small in those experiments (less heartbreak; less frustration). For many of these crops, incorporating them back into the soil is a big component for success. I need to be able to do that with a simple hoe. Fingers crossed.

Phew. A LOT of ground to cover - so-to-speak. Hope this - at the very least - peaks your interest.

Suppliers of cover crops:
Southern Exposure Seed Exchange
Johnny's Selected Seeds

The Lasagna Bed: The Very Basics

Okay, I am mildly ashamed that it took me so long to figure this one out.

The Lasagna Bed.

A No-Till Method.

Why did I spend several seasons moving earth, when all I needed to do was create something on top of the earth? Gears start turning, mouth opens slightly, smoke rises from ears. Ahh - I see . . .

This is my first attempt - I felt a great sense of accomplishment after less than an hour this past weekend. And my back was the better for it.

The bottom layer is cardboard. (I made an arrangement with the local health food store to ferret through their weekly recycling pile.) Ideally, you'll need to wet the cardboard and then start with your layers. I'm testing out compost, mixed with shredded leaves, some coco(nut)-peat and eventually, grass clippings. Then, lots of mulch. Repeat.

As everything starts to decompose - you pull the layers apart and start planting. I'm going to create paths and just put hardwood mulch from our county's solid waste authority over those sections of the cardboard mulch.

An even bigger shortcut, for small spaces, would be to buy bags of potting soil, lay them flat on the ground, cut them open and plant di-rectly. Throw a little compost and mulch its way and you should be ready to plant your new-fangled flower bed.

I've heard that you need to wait a year for everything to break down - but I'm hoping for something a bit sooner (which is why I am using already decomposed compost and coco-peat). Patience is something I still only aspire to practicing.

It doesn't look like much now, so you need a lot of vision. I'm hoping for some natives - Black-eyed Susans, Echinacea, False Blue Indigo and Phlox. Vision! Which is what most of us gardeners seem to thrive upon anyway . . .

Local Color: Virginia Native Plant Society

Virginia Native Plant Society
Boyce, Virginia
http://www.vnps.org/

Native plants are a big part of organic gardening - as they acclimate to your garden site without needing pesticides or fertilizers. They also don't require as much in the way of watering and coddling. They know the land, they know the conditions. Drought? Sure thing. Clay soil? No problem. Bring it on.

I'm planning a small native plant/sitting garden and have found that the Virginia Native Plant Society site offers just what I need to learn the basics. They have an extensive list of native plant nurseries and, on the flip side, a list of invasive and alien plant species of Virginia. And the group isn't preachy - just excited about the possibilities of introducing natives to your gardening world.

Visit this section for a detailed overview on why planting natives is so important - but also why it is so rewarding - . One of the points that got me was the thought of attracting more butterflies, song birds . . . and hummingbirds!

The Virginia Native Plant Society also increases awareness of these plants through workshops, newsletters and the Wildflower of the Year.

These Wildflower of the Year photos are courtesy of the Society. Counterclockwise from bottom; Virginia Bluebells (Mertensia virginica) - photo by S.G. Shetler; Trailing Arbutus (Epigaea repens) - photo by W.S. Justice; and Large-Flowered Trillium (Trillium grandiflorum) - photo by S.G. Shetler.

Next year - a woodland garden! Be still my heart . . .